Martin Scorsese, of course, needs no introduction as one of the greatest living filmmakers, whose work encompasses more than 50 years of powerful cinematic experiences.
But these days, his daughter Francesca Scorsese doesn’t need much of an introduction either: An actress and filmmaker whose credits include Luca Guadagnino‘s We Are Who We Are, the 25 year old hasn’t been shy about her family legacy. A phenomenon on TikTok, Francesca introduced her father to the social media platform, and has brought his playful energy to a whole new generation.
Needless to say, when I got the rare opportunity to speak with Marty — as I think it’s OK to call him — about how he might get involved with the Southampton Playhouse, I instantly thought about his public dynamic with Francesca. Together they represent two very different generations of audiences: one reared on the New York City repertory scene of the 1960s, and the other forged in the vernacular of Gen Z.
But Francesca isn’t your average online influencer. That’s kind of impossible when your dad is Martin Scorsese. From an early age, Marty was showing Francesca a wide array of movies to expose her to the art form as she grew up. And that experience is now one that audiences at the Southampton Playhouse will get with our new series, The Scorsese Family Experience. (Read more about the series in this Deadline article.)
From the naturalism of Italian neorealism to the slapstick of Charlie Chaplin, this new series stems from Marty’s decade-spanning viewing log, which landed in my inbox a few months ago as a revelation. We are also thrilled to present the film that Marty cites as a seminal viewing experience from his own childhood, The Wizard of Oz, in a rarely-screened IMAX 3D format that showcases its timeless cinematic power.
The series kicks off at the Playhouse this summer, but it will remain an evergreen in our programming, returning monthly with more films from an outstanding list throughout the year and beyond. In other words, the journey is just beginning.
A few weeks ago, I spent nearly an hour with Marty and Francesca talking about their journey through film history together. It was a fun, informative, and at times even emotional conversation about the personal bond that movies can create for parents and their children.
The recording of that conversation, which is embedded below, forms the inaugural episode of our new podcast Movie People: Interviews and More from the Southampton Playhouse.
Each week, new episodes will drop featuring conversations from a wide array of creative individuals sharing their passion for the moving image, from filmmakers to actors and many others. Future installments will range from conversations recorded in front of live audiences at the Playhouse to others recorded around the world. They will explore the past and present of movies and related art forms as well as their future.
Enjoy the first episode below.
Showtimes for The Scorsese Family Experience at the Southampton Playhouse are listed below along with recommended age groups. Note: Audiences without kids are welcome, too!
Check the site for more information and additional showtimes.
Thursday, August 14
Bicycle Thieves (Vittorio De Sica, 1948) Ages 12 and Up
7:30PM
“One of the pillars of neorealist cinema. These movies, made by a group of Italian filmmakers in the years following WWII, had an impact that is still being felt today. The critic Lindsay Anderson, who later became a director, wrote about neorealism in 1948. He asked: ‘What is it about these Italian pictures that makes the impression they create so overwhelming?’ Anderson answered his own question. He said, ‘The key to these films is, first, their tremendous actuality; second, their honesty, and third, their passionate pleading for what we’ve come to term human values.’ No director expressed those values better than Vittorio De Sico, and very few films have been as meaningful to people as The Bicycle Thief. It was seen all over the world. For many years – especially in the 1950s and 1960s – The Bicycle Thief was considered the peak moment, the pinnacle of neorealism.
“To me, these movies define the most precious moment in film history, when illusion took a backseat to reality. The performances in The Bicycle Thief were not actors. They were ordinary people De Sica found in the streets of Rome. The story is modest. The pace is deliberate as we follow a father and son searching for a stolen bicycle. It’s a small thing, perhaps, but their story means the world to them, and perhaps changed the course of cinema.”
– Martin Scorsese, Turner Classic Movies, 2002
Friday, August 15
Playtime (Jacques Tati, 1967) Ages 12 and Up
7:00PM
French director Jacques Tati isn’t as widely known in America as Charlie Chaplin, but deserves as much acclaim for expanding the potential of big screen comedy, and Playtime is his indisputable masterpiece. As his onscreen alter ego Monsieur Hulot (who appeared in two earlier Tati films), the filmmaker and star drifts through a vast, intricate set loaded with visual gags that comment on contemporary architecture, design, and technology.
Though he barely mutters a word, Monsieur Hulot embodies the sense of confusion from an older generation confronting an alien world overwhelmed by modernity. Sliding doors, cubicles, and a crowded dance floor all figure into the character’s awkward journey through various parts of Paris, as plot takes a backseat to the cinematic equivalent of a popup book, as Monsieur Hulot stumbles through one baffling structure after another, roaming a world moving too fast for him to process it. This is a deceptively simple work that even younger audiences can enjoy getting lost in, though it grows deeper with repeat viewings, especially on the big screen.
Writing for The Guardian, Martin Scorsese described Playtime as a movie with the uncanny ability to “stretch the possibilities of time, space, sound, and color to their limits, well beyond what we were used to seeing in most comedies.”
Saturday, August 16
The Thief of Bagdad (Michael Powell, 1940) Ages 5 and Up
1:30PM
Years before Aladdin, British director Michael Powell and producer Alexander Korda offered up this visually rich fantasy adaptation of Arabian Nights starring Indian teen actor Sabu as Abu, a street thief who joins forces with the magnetic Sultan of Bagdad (John Justin) to take back the kingdom from the evil Jaffar (Conrad Veidt, also famous as the villain of the seminal German Expressionist film The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari). Merging state-of-the-art “blue screen” technology with mesmerizing hand drawn backdrops and other early special effects, the movie is a visual marvel that has grown more transcendent and poetic with age: It’s an ideal starting point for witnessing the unique magic of cinema, which is exactly the effect it had on a young Martin Scorsese.
Scorsese first saw Arabian Nights on television in the late 1940s, when it was in black and white; he would come to appreciate its brilliant colors and big-screen splendor decades later. “Abu reminds me of Peter Pan, in a way,” Scorsese said in a directors commentary for the film. “He wants to remain in a fantasy, a Neverland in a way, where time is something that can be suspended and life is a constant adventure.”
Saturday, August 16
The Wizard of Oz in IMAX 3D (Victor Fleming, 1939) Ages 10 and Up
5:00PM
Martin Scorsese has cited the moment that The Wizard of Oz transitions from black and white to color as his wakeup call to the power of cinema. It’s a timeless musical adventure that many subsequent generations have found similarly transporting, and remains as visually stunning today as it was nearly 90 years ago.
Judy Garland’s Dorothy, marching down the Yellow Brick Road with the Lion, the Scarecrow, and the Tin Man as they search for the respective aid of courage, brains, and a heart, has become one of the most timeless achievements in film history for obvious reasons: Masterful visuals and transcendent world-building glide along effortlessly to the tune of ever-familiar songs that result in the most lyrical coming-of-age odyssey in Hollywood history. Wicked fans eager for the November release of Wicked for Good should be able to satiate themselves with this delectable repertory offering.
See it at the Playhouse in the rarely-screen IMAX 3D edition to experience the spectacular nature of the movie all over again – or, in some viewers’ cases, for the first time.
Sunday, August 17
Playhour Jr. Double Bill! Ages 5 and Up
10:30AM
The Red Balloon (Albert Lamorisse, 1955) / A Dog’s Life (Charlie Chaplin, 1918)
Our weekly Playhouse Jr. matinee series turns to Martin and Francesca Scorsese for this pair of short film offerings that tap into the sweet simplicity of silent movies from two different eras. In A Dog’s Life (33 minutes), Chaplin joins forces with a stray dog as the Tramp evades an angry police officer and wreaks havoc at a cabaret, inadvertently taking down a pair of thieves in the process. The French masterpiece The Red Balloon (34 minutes) follows a young boy as he befriends a balloon adrift in Paris as it leads through the city. Both movies are tinged with melancholy even as they arrive at uplifting messages about the triumph of the human spirit. Together they serve as ideal access points to the blend of visual storytelling and emotion that are unique to the art of cinema.